60 SALE OF A WIFE. 



water-carrier, had a good-looking and very 

 hard-working wife ; but they got on indifferent- 

 ly together, and one day the Bheestun went off 

 with her mother, brother, and his wife. The 

 husband and his friends pursued the fugitives, 

 who were overtaken at the Buttee Ferry, 

 opposite to Larkhana, and brought back, under- 

 going severe treatment, I was told, on the 

 way. After arriving at Khyrpoor, the hus- 

 band, having flogged the poor woman most 

 cruelly, divorced her, though he did not pre- 

 tend to any feelings of jealousy ; and, much to the 

 annoyance of his own father, with whom she 

 was a favourite, sold her for sixty rupees, £6 

 sterling, to the Afghan Jemadar of Horse, 

 Hubbeeb Khan, with whom she seemed to 

 lead a much less laborious life than that of a 

 water-carrier, her scanty attire being cast 

 away, and handsome garments befitting her 

 change of position assumed ; whilst her princi- 

 pal duty seemed to be preparing the Jemadar's 

 pipe and handing it to him. These domestic 

 matters were indeed very visible to myself, from 

 my Bala Khana overlooking the platform on 

 which the Jemadar passed most of his time on a 

 char^oy^ smoking, when not in attendance on 



